FEATURES
Rap Song of the Week: Remy Ma and Rapsody Assert Dominance on DJ Premier’s “Remy Rap”
Rap Song of the Week is a Friday roundup of the hip-hop tracks you need to hear. Check out the full playlist here. Today, Remy Ma and Rapsody team up on DJ Premier’s “Remy Rap.” For DJ Premier’s new EP celebrating the upcoming 50th anniversary of hip-hop, the pioneering producer handpicked a lineup of rappers known for their lyricism including Nas, Lil Wayne, and Run the Jewels. Preemo also paired up seasoned MCs Remy Ma and Rapsody on the track “Remy Rap,” which finds both women letting out frustration about being underestimated in a male-dominated industry. Remy in particular spits with a fire in her belly, calling on female rappers to level up and expressing resentment for her pen game being questioned. After coming up as part of Big Pun and Fat Joe’s Terror Squad and later marryin...
Lizzo’s Vibrant New Album Makes Us All Feel Special
“Hi motherfucker, did you miss me?” Lizzo asks by way of introduction on “The Sign,” the bouncy first song on her new album Special (available today, July 15th — stream it below). Quite honestly, we did. How has the Grammy-winning chart-topper been spending her time since we last saw her? Lizzo is happy to share: She’s been healing, making smoothies, training and twerking — plus, working hard on this record, her follow up to 2019’s Cuz I Love You. In just about everything she does, Lizzo has a magical knack for making the listener or viewer feel like her best friend, whether it’s her candid and cheeky TikTok presence, inclusive energy onstage (get tickets to her upcoming tour here), or stories told through her music. Of the 12 tracks on the album, two were released ahead of time as si...
40 Years Ago, Judas Priest Released the Heavy Metal Rallying Cry Screaming for Vengeance
Judas Priest began the ’80s with a bang by unleashing the all-time metal classic British Steel in 1980 — an LP that spawned the anthems “Living After Midnight,” “Breaking the Law,” and “Metal Gods.” So when it came to a follow-up, why not figure they would take it to the next level? Turns out, 1981’s Point of Entry was a surprisingly unfocused effort (especially when compared to its predecessor). But Priest — singer Rob Halford, guitarists Glenn Tipton and KK Downing, bassist Ian Hill, and drummer Dave Holland — more than made up for the fumble with their eighth studio effort, 1982’s Screaming for Vengeance. Recorded from January through May of ’82 (with Tom Allom once again handling production duties), two studios were utilized — Ibiza Sound Studios in Ibiza, Spain, and Beejay Studio...
5 Albums I Can’t Live Without: Wesley Schultz of The Lumineers
Name Wesley Schultz Best known for Bearing a strong resemblance to Princess Bride main character also named “Wesley,” Cary Elwes: “AS YOU WISHHHH…” Current City I live in Denver, CO, am currently on tour in Grand Rapids, MI. Really want to be in Daydreaming of being in South Africa at a vineyard drinking copious amounts of wine or on a safari drinking copious amounts of wine. Excited about The Brightside world tour we are on which starts in North America and moves on to Asia, South Africa, Australia and India later in the year. My current music collection has a lot of Singer songwriters from the 70s in it. And a little bit of A healthy amount of Motown. Preferred format I like Vinyl in the house–we put a record player in the kitchen because ...
Resident Evil Adaptations Explained: A Licker’s Guide to 20 Years of Films and TV Shows
The history of video game adaptations is replete with failure, Hollywood attempting to glom the thin characters, ropey storylines, and innately gamified nature of popular game franchises to the big or small screens. Some work better than others (Mortal Kombat ’95 good; Mortal Kombat ’21 bad), but few franchises have tried as often as Resident Evil. Capcom’s flagship action-horror franchise has been a staple for decades, with dozens of games under its umbrella (eh?). It’s a series with deep, convoluted mythology, with the evil Umbrella Corporation and its attendant T-viruses and G-viruses. There’s also a host of grizzled protagonists, slimy beasties, and helpless young girls your characters are forced to rescue. But adapting the material to film or TV becomes tricky...
With Jack in the Box, j-hope Isn’t Afraid to Embrace the Darkness
“It was Hope that was kept in the innermost nook of the box. It trailed behind the miasma of darkness, assuaging the ill effects on humankind. Hope gave people the will to keep on living amidst the pain and strife.” The introduction of j-hope’s full-length debut solo album, Jack in the Box, is a female voice recounting the myth of Pandora’s Box; it’s a story j-hope, who was born Jung Hoseok, has long gravitated towards, and a partial source of his stage name. For nearly a decade now as part of BTS, j-hope has more than lived up to the name. He’s embodied it — epitomized it, even — by developing a reputation as the ray of sunshine in the global, record-smashing group. His energy onstage is astounding; anyone who is lucky enough to have seen BTS in concert inevitably walks away amazed by the...
30 Years Ago, Megadeth’s Countdown to Extinction Tackled Politics and Personal Demons
By the start of the ’90s, Megadeth were on track to dominate heavy metal. After all, 1990’s Rust in Peace garnered stellar sales and press reviews, with the corresponding Clash of the Titans tour — featuring Megadeth, Slayer, and Anthrax — further bolstering their hegemony. Plus, as he confessed to Guitar School in 1993, Megadeth mastermind Dave Mustaine was finally getting “stone sober” after years of addiction to marijuana, cocaine, cigarettes, heroin, and other vices. At the same time, however, the meteoric rise of grunge meant that metal was becoming “the red-headed stepchild of the music industry” (as Mustaine postulated to Goldmine in 2012). Advertisement Although they faced some industry pressure to follow the tides, Mustaine told Patch.com the same year, Megadeth chose instead to “...
SPIN DNA: Groundbreaking Investigative Journalist Rory Nugent ‘Inside the IRA’
In this ongoing series, we revisit some of our most memorable moments with SPIN’s journalists, photographers and editors. Writer Rory Nugent started working with SPIN in 1993, brought in by our then Features Editor Elizabeth Mitchell. He hit it off with Editor in Chief Bob Guccione Jr, who was looking for the right writer to get inside the Irish Republican Army, who had been terrorizing Britian for decades. And as they say, the rest is history… And what history he made. With his incredible adventures inside the IRA, after which, in the article, he correctly predicted the so-called Good Friday peace treaty with the British government. Or that time the news declared him deceased. Or when his boat capsized and he was adrift for days in the ocean. And his time in Sudan, where he wa...
Struggling to Find Software Developers? This May Be Why
We use cookies on our website to give you the most relevant experience by remembering your preferences and repeat visits. By clicking “Accept All”, you consent to the use of ALL the cookies. However, you may visit “Cookie Settings” to provide a controlled consent.
Alanis Morissette (Finally) Celebrates 25 Years of Jagged Little Pill in Montreal: Review, Video, and Setlist
Like so many other highly anticipated world tours, Canadian singer-songwriter Alanis Morissette had to wait an extra two years to finally mark 25 Years of Jagged Little Pill — or if we’re being pedantic, 27 years. After kicking things off in Europe, the Ottawa native began the North American leg of the tour in her hometown on July 10th before performing at Montreal’s Bell Centre two days later. (Get tickets to the rest of her upcoming dates here!) Although the night started with harmonica blazing to album opener “All I Really Want,” the rest of the evening in Montreal didn’t flow exactly as the Jagged Little Pill recording. The 48-year-old, with the same athletic stage-hopping zeal from her youth, played the entire album mostly out of order, with a few other hits such as “Uninvited” and “T...
Mad Cool Festival 2022 Recap: Five Days of Sunshine and Songs in Spain’s Capital City
It’s been three years since Madrid has been able to host Mad Cool Festival, the multi-day music festival in the Valdefuentes neighborhood of Spain’s capital city. With the event finally making a grand return in 2022 from Wednesday, July 6th to Sunday, July 11th, not even temperatures crossing over 100 degrees each day could keep the crowds from flocking to the grounds. One thing about Mad Cool is that it very much lives up to its name; the crowd for the fest, incredibly welcoming and friendly, really and truly loves music, and the dynamic lineup always boasts something for everyone — especially this year. Indie fans were able to delight in rising bands and solo artists, while fans of legacy acts like Metallica showed up in droves. Pop fans weren’t left out either; each day offered at least...
Emmys 2022: This Year’s Wildest, Weirdest, and Most Surprising Nominations
The thing about the Emmy Awards is that there are so many of them. When the nominations are announced each fateful annual Tuesday in July, the nice folks who show up early to announce them (this year, J.B. Smooth and Melissa Fumero were charming and capable) only cover a fraction of what’s then posted online in a massive PDF document (this year’s is 58 pages long). Buried within this document are no shortage of delights and surprises, which may not make headlines but do warrant a little attention. So here are this year’s unexpected favorites: Shows you might have thought would go totally ignored by the TV Academy, stars who you might not have even known were working in television, and seriously overdue talent finally getting their roses. Chadwick Boseman’s Posthumous Nod <img data-lazy-...
